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features 2. On the Cover The Harbaugh Years 14. Legacy Of Leaders Western Alums Rise to Presidential Status 24. The Mills Twins Young entrepreneurs find success at WKU’s Center for Research and departments Development 10 Campus News 19 Campaign Headquarters 22 Western History 28 Athletics 33 Alumni Association 36 Chapter News 37 Best Kept Secret 39 Class Notes 48 Commentary Photo by Joe Imel Photo by The HARBAUGH YEARS By Kyle Hightower Forty-one years ago, Jack Harbaugh es, that Canton, Ohio. YThe one that is home to the National Football began his career raking leaves in the League Hall of Fame and dances daily in the minds of today’s NFL players and coaches who backyard of football excellence. hope to be immortalized there one day. Canton is to football what the North Pole is to children – a Mecca. The year was 1961. It is probably the one place on the planet where a professional sport’s greatest moments can truly be admired by both young and old generations alike. The place was Canton Elementary In 1961, Harbaugh was the poster child for the young generation of the day. School in Canton, Ohio. He was just an infant coach then, a newborn 22- year-old barely a few steps removed from his crib at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. 2 Western Kentucky University Photo by Sheryl Hagan-Booth At the time, Harbaugh’s resume´ was much too slim to garner a head coaching job, so he clung to his ambitions and bach- elor’s degree from BGSU in those early years. He knew he would get his chance at immortality one day. “I never really had any hobbies besides football other than my wife, my family and my grand- kids,” Harbaugh said. “Working never really excited me. And, what I’ve done has not been work. I would have gladly paid them to let me coach to let me do it if I thought it would pay the bills at home because coach- ing is what I love to do.” But, after 41 years of trudging through a coaching career that has included stops at some of college football’s most renowned programs, only recently have people started to revel in the “What this championship has journey that Harbaugh has made done is show me how the game as time has inched on. of football has allowed me and Only now after winning his my wife and family to experience first national championship is he the good people that have been a receiving the acclaim for the job part of our lives. It staggered he has done cultivating not only me.” athletes, but capable young men To know Jack Harbaugh is to as well. know the meaning of the word He knows because they let him humble. know by burying him with To know what he has meant to phone calls and letters in the Western Kentucky University’s weeks since he could hardly football program, perhaps it is express his championship joy in best left to Wes Strader, the long- words standing under a shower time Hilltopper radio play-by- of praise in Chattanooga. play man who called so many of And even as Harbaugh decided his games. to bid farewell to Western – “He means everything, period,” resigning in February – he is per- Strader said of Harbaugh. “For haps closer now than ever to the past 14 years, that man has realizing the dreams that began been everything to Western foot- Joe Imel Photo by in Canton so many years ago. ball.” “I guess the word is ‘blessed,’ And for 14 seasons, Jack but I’m not sure I know what the Harbaugh never once talked of right word is,” Harbaugh said. 4 Western Kentucky University ing the art of smashing heads things have been mementos like and pounding bodies. It only pictures that could use Windex awakened him to the symbols he and old, tattered signs clinging to has collected along the way. rusty, stale thumbtacks. “If I hadn’t been part of this Pictures of guys like Don team and championship, it Nehlen, his former coach and wouldn’t have been crushing. A mentor at Bowling Green trophy is just a State and for- symbol,” mer Michigan Harbaugh said. coach Bo “But if it were Schembechler not for this Working never whom experience really excited me. Harbaugh (winning a coached under title) I would “ for seven years And what I’ve done have went to in the 1970s. Photo by SherylPhoto by Hagan-Booth my grave not has not been work. Signs whisper- knowing the ing of extinc- magnitude I would have gladly tion like “Those these past 41 who stay will years have had paid them to let me be champions” in people I’ve coach to let me do after the pro- been privileged gram nearly to know.” it if I thought it went south in Not one tro- the early 1990s phy used to sit would pay the bills and catchy bat- on the shelf tle cries from behind Jack at home because seasons passed Harbaugh’s coaching is what I such as the desk inside the 2002 “FINISH” Western foot- love to do. that was ridden ball office. all the way to Not one. championship That space ” glory. was instead “If he reserved for the symbols the 63- (Harbaugh) hadn’t dug in heels year-old Western coach collected the way he did, it would’ve Photo by Joe Imel Photo by in his 41-year journey to what died,” said legendary former everyone kept telling him was Hilltoppers’ coach and athletic the pinnacle of his coaching director Jimmy Feix in regards to career. the program nearly going under. But, the truth is, old football Feix is one of only two persons championships, only building coaches like Harbaugh don’t to have his jersey immortalized champions. need trophies. They only need outside of L.T. Smith Stadium. That didn’t even change in the things that remind them of The other is one of Harbaugh’s December when the 63-year-old where they’ve been in hopes that recruits and former players – coach captured the elusive it will help them figure out where Willie Taggart. national crown that had eluded to go next. Taggart, who was maybe his grasps for 41 years of coach- And, for Harbaugh, those Western’s best-ever quarterback 5 Alumni Spring 2003 Photo by Joe Imel Photo by and the NCAA’s all-time career that game he has received proba- rushing leader at the position, is bly triple that in letters of con- currently the Toppers’ offensive gratulation. coordinator. “Seeing those former players in “I look up to him a lot,” the stands just showed me how Taggart said. “I can’t say I was much of a football fraternity we that surprised to see him leave it have here for guys who’ve worn because he has done so much for the red and white jersey – that so the program and me personally many people feel ownership in and I’m going to miss him being what we try to do here,” here.” Harbaugh said. “They bought But, the fact is, he won’t be on into it and part of that trophy is the Hill when Taggart returns to theirs.” the sidelines next year. And, that is what trophies have Like those that Harbaugh him- always meant for Harbaugh. A self used to look up to as models symbol of the achievements and of what it takes to build the accomplishments of others. whole person through teaching Humble. Even as he walks off football, so too must Taggart do. into the sunset. SherylPhoto by Hagan-Booth Around 40-45 of Harbaugh’s former players representing Kyle Hightower is a junior print almost every season he’s coached journalism major from Paducah, at Western lined the stands at the Kentucky. He is the sports editor for Dec. 20 championship game in the College Heights Herald. Chattanooga. In the weeks since 6 Western Kentucky University TrueFan WKU Fan Lives Happily in a Sea of Red By Jacob Bennett Martha Lloyd’s house is easy to spot—it’s the one with Western decals on the door. She even put out two red towels for as long as WKU had a basketball team in the NCAA tournament. And then she opens the door. From the WKU sun catcher in the living room to the WKU magnets on the refrigerator to the painting signed by Jack and Jim Harbaugh in her bedroom, Photo by SherylPhoto by Hagan-Booth the inside of her house also looks like Big Red went berserk in a special episode of “Trading Spaces.” “I dare anybody to come into this house and not know where I went to school,” Lloyd said. Martha Lloyd (’72) amidst just some of her WKU memorabilia At games, it’s also easy to spot Lloyd herself — “I’m the loudest homecoming weekend in 1967. days is the good play of her for- one,” she said. She enrolled as a freshman the mer students on North Hardin The 1972 grad could have the next fall, and got the first of her High School’s boys’ basketball reddest blood of any WKU fan— three teaching degrees in 1972. team. This year she juggled a season ticket holder for basket- Lloyd has been a sports nut WKU’s men’s and women’s bas- ball and football, for 30 years since she was little and she spent ketball tournament appearances she has driven more than an her Saturdays and Sundays with the Trojans’ tournament hour from her home in Radcliff watching pigskin.

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